Order of Man - Politically Incorrect

00:00:00.000 If you're anything like me, you are absolutely fed up with the noise and nonsense that we see

00:00:05.360 in mainstream and social media. It seems that everywhere we turn and with everything we say,

00:00:10.660 people are looking for reasons to be upset and offended. My guest today does not allow

00:00:15.940 any of that to back him down or dictate the conversations that he wants to have

00:00:19.900 on some very important subjects everyone else seems too afraid to talk about from

00:00:24.580 sexual orientation, religion, masculinity, politics, and just about every other topic that

00:00:30.200 we're quote unquote, not supposed to talk about. His name is Chad Prather. And today we talk about

00:00:35.560 our responsibility to speak up, calling boys into manhood, the rise of the victim culture

00:00:41.380 and the power of being politically incorrect. You're a man of action. You live life to the

00:00:47.120 fullest, embrace your fears and boldly chart your own path. When life knocks you down,

00:00:51.720 you get back up one more time. Every time you are not easily deterred or defeated,

00:00:57.420 rugged, resilient, strong. This is your life. This is who you are. This is who you will become

00:01:04.060 at the end of the day. And after all is said and done, you can call yourself a man.

00:01:10.260 Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Ryan Mickler and I am the host and the founder of this

00:01:14.260 podcast, The Order of Man. I want to welcome you, whether you're listening for the very first time

00:01:19.460 today or you've been with us for a year or two years or four years, however long we've been going.

00:01:25.540 I'm glad you're here. We need more men in this fight. And trust me, guys, this is a fight. It's

00:01:28.960 a fight to reclaim and restore what it means to be a man. And although there may not be some

00:01:34.720 predetermined enemy, I think if we approach this as a fight, as a battle where we have strategies and

00:01:40.820 we have thoughts and we have ideas and we have objectives and things that we want to accomplish,

00:01:44.520 not just in society in general, but in our own lives and in the lives of our family members

00:01:49.900 and community members and employees or employers, our clients, whoever we're trying to serve.

00:01:55.820 It's our job as men to step up and be the type of men that we're capable of being. So what I'm doing

00:02:01.420 on a weekly basis in order to accomplish that objective is to bring you some of the best conversations

00:02:08.180 that I can have with some of the most incredible, inspiring, successful men on the planet.

00:02:13.400 These are guys like Jocko Willink, Andy Frisilla, Tim Kennedy, TJ Dillashaw, David Goggins. And then

00:02:20.880 today I've got Chad Prather on the show. And I know a lot of you guys are familiar with him.

00:02:24.640 And if you're not, I'm going to introduce you here in a minute. So we've got this interview show.

00:02:28.380 We do our ask me anything with my co-host Kip Sorensen on Wednesday. So that's tomorrow.

00:02:33.140 And then of course your Friday field notes, which is just me and some of my thoughts that I figured

00:02:37.800 I'd share with you about masculinity and what it means to be a man. So excited to be here with you.

00:02:43.140 I only have a few announcements, but I do want to make sure I share these things with you. I know

00:02:47.140 guys, I've been talking with you about origin for gosh, maybe even close to a year now, but I'm so

00:02:54.280 honored to be able to partner with these guys. And one of the things that they have coming up

00:02:57.880 in the fall of this year, specifically August 25th through September 1st, I believe I'll have to

00:03:05.140 confirm those dates, but that's what it looks like is their origin immersion camp. This is a week-long

00:03:09.880 camp in Maine. Hopefully by then I'll be moved out there, but it's a week-long jujitsu camp with the

00:03:16.880 origin team. Jocko was out there. Leif Babin was out there last time, Dave Burke, just the echelon

00:03:23.440 front team. And man, I can't even begin to describe how incredible this experience is. So if you're

00:03:30.260 interested, head to origin, Maine as in the state, Maine origin, Maine.com slash order camp. Let me

00:03:37.360 say that again, origin, Maine.com slash order camp. Now, if you go to that site, you're going to see

00:03:44.420 what options they have first session, second session, or if you want to be there all week,

00:03:48.260 like I will be, and also Kip Sorensen will be get registered very, very quickly. Cause I know

00:03:53.360 they're going to sell out again, it's origin, Maine.com slash order camp. All right. Check that

00:03:59.660 out. Number two, I just partnered up with Hoyt. Uh, I have been bow hunting for gosh, the past year

00:04:07.140 and a half now. And I've used Hoyt bows. I've owned three bows, two bows myself and one for my wife.

00:04:13.300 And I just talked with Hoyt about doing a giveaway. So if you're interested in winning

00:04:18.380 their brand new bow, the Helix, we've got a giveaway that started yesterday as of the release

00:04:24.720 of this podcast, and it goes until the end of this month, March. So you've got to get on this very,

00:04:29.900 very quickly. Again, it's the Hoyt Helix. Uh, I believe it's valued at just under $1,200,

00:04:35.240 no gimmicks, no catches. All you need to do is go to order of man.com slash Hoyt order of man.com

00:04:42.900 slash Hoyt, follow the instructions there, get yourself registered for a chance to

00:04:48.360 win a brand new Hoyt Helix bow. Very cool bow, very powerful tool and weapon at your disposal

00:04:54.980 to help increase your hunting game or get you in the game. If you haven't yet again,

00:05:00.200 that's order of man.com slash Hoyt. All right. Those are my announcements. Now I am excited

00:05:05.800 to introduce you to my guest. Now I know a lot of you guys probably don't need an introduction to this

00:05:10.400 guy. His videos are viral. His ability to communicate is unparalleled. He's absolutely

00:05:16.220 incredible and he's willing to have some conversations that most people aren't, which is

00:05:20.160 why I wanted to have him on the podcast. Again, his name is Chad Prather and you probably, or might

00:05:24.760 know him as the political cowboy. He is a comedian. He's a political commentator willing to discuss and

00:05:31.840 even have some fun with some of the most polarizing topics in society today. He's been entertaining

00:05:37.840 people since he was six years old. He's been on Fox news, A&E, CNN, MSN, the blaze. In fact,

00:05:44.600 he's been so many places that I can't list all the things that he's up to. In fact, he's also got a

00:05:48.880 comedy tour going on right now. That said, I'm excited to have the chance to sit down and talk

00:05:54.460 with someone who I admire, not only for his perspective and his interesting approach to

00:05:58.220 sharing it, but his willingness to do so in an environment that seems to be increasingly

00:06:03.440 wanting to shut down these types of conversations. So guys, without further ado, Chad Prather.

00:06:11.000 Chad, what's going on, man? Thanks for joining me on the show today.

00:06:13.780 Hey, Ryan. It's good to be with you, man. I appreciate you having me on.

00:06:16.540 Oh yeah, of course. I've been, gosh, I've been following you for a couple of years now. And

00:06:19.700 I mean, I always get a smile when I listen to your videos, but they're incredibly insightful as well,

00:06:23.880 which is something that seems to be a lost art. I think more and more we dive into this

00:06:28.480 social media world that we live in.

00:06:30.160 And it's been an interesting little journey for me. My idea originally several years ago was to

00:06:34.920 use social media to take truth and wrap it in humor and make it an easier pill to swallow.

00:06:40.700 I think for the most part, we've been able to accomplish that pretty well.

00:06:43.560 Well, I think that's probably why you're so popular and why your videos go viral is because

00:06:47.700 they are humorous, they are entertaining. But it's interesting too, because I think you and

00:06:52.860 your personality have the ability to polarize people, right? Not intentionally or deliberately,

00:06:57.120 but I think people either love what you have to share or they despise what it is you're saying

00:07:01.420 and everything you stand for. There's no middle ground, I imagine.

00:07:04.260 No. And I've never tried to be, for lack of better phrases, a flamethrower. I don't go out

00:07:09.660 and point fingers or engage in any vitriol, but I do want to start a conversation. And I think that's

00:07:15.440 where the division happens. And one of the big things that I have issue with is I think that we've

00:07:20.460 gotten to a point in our culture where we can't just have a conversation anymore. It has to be an

00:07:24.980 argument. And that's been kind of a big point for me is just saying, hey, let's learn how to

00:07:28.980 discuss and dialogue again.

00:07:31.000 Why do you think that is? Because I agree with you. I think so many people struggle. I think a lot

00:07:35.340 of it comes down to, hey, I just want to win this debate or this conversation or interaction.

00:07:39.740 But what would you say as far as why it does seem to be a challenge to actually have a meaningful

00:07:44.400 dialogue with someone?

00:07:46.380 I think a big part of it is we don't know each other anymore. We used to know our neighbors. You know,

00:07:51.520 if we lived out in the country, we helped them pull the tractor out of the ditch. If we lived in

00:07:54.800 the city, we lived on top of each other. Now we hit a button and the garage door goes up and we

00:07:59.080 pull the car in, the garage door comes down and we don't know our neighbor's kid's name, but we think

00:08:02.760 we can argue politics with them from seven states away on a computer. And that's the kind of thing

00:08:07.200 that bugs me. You know, we don't know each other. We don't take the time to get to know each other

00:08:10.660 anymore. There's a virtual world and there's a real world. You know, I don't walk into a restaurant

00:08:15.100 and try to pick out the people that I can argue politics with or disagree with. But it's funny how we do

00:08:20.060 that with strangers online. And so I think social media in a big way has given us permission,

00:08:25.820 unfortunately, to go out there and express the anger towards each other. And I don't know that

00:08:31.000 we're necessarily even angry with each other anymore. We just don't know how to disagree.

00:08:35.300 And that's troublesome.

00:08:36.620 Yeah, that's a good point because I even think about neighbors, for example, that we don't agree

00:08:40.300 on everything. I might think what they do or the way they're raising their kids or something else

00:08:43.600 might be a little weird or strange. But I saw their daughter who is battling cancer. And so there's a

00:08:48.660 little bit more empathy towards that individual. And we can be friends regardless of how we feel

00:08:53.100 about politics or the way we raise kids or any of these polarizing subjects in society.

00:08:59.480 Yeah, I agree. I was just having a conversation on my podcast, The Chad Prather Show, with a number

00:09:04.540 of my guys that are producers for both the podcast and my TV show, Humor Me on Blaze TV. I travel with

00:09:11.700 these guys all over the country. I don't philosophically or theologically or in every way culturally agree

00:09:17.640 with them. And I don't expect them to agree with me. But that doesn't stop us from being really great

00:09:21.400 friends and being able to have a great conversation and communicate and talk with each other. I don't

00:09:26.040 come to a relationship with this set of requirements that says you have to believe all these things

00:09:30.220 exactly like me. And I don't know that we've matured enough. And maybe it's we've had so much

00:09:36.560 in this new generation that's come along where we just haven't been told no enough or dealt with

00:09:41.880 enough rejection or even persecution to even know how to deal with disagreements.

00:09:46.080 That's interesting. I mean, there certainly seems from my perspective, a lot less conflict

00:09:49.980 or struggle in our lives. You know, I look at my kids, for example, and I try to introduce that

00:09:53.840 stuff in a controlled environment because I want them to be exposed to hardship. If it's cold,

00:09:58.240 they turn on the heater. If it's hot, they turn on the air conditioner. If they, we can start my car

00:10:02.140 from inside the house, you know, to get that thing cranked and so the heat's going. They want some

00:10:06.300 food, they run down to the grocery store. They don't have to go hunting. I see a deer on your wall.

00:10:09.960 Nobody has to do any of this stuff anymore. Anytime there's just an inkling of hardship, whether that's,

00:10:15.940 oh man, somebody's persecuting because they happen to disagree with me to,

00:10:19.600 you know, the weather's a little rough. We crumble. It's amazing to me.

00:10:22.700 It's a little pathetic, actually. A lot of pathetic.

00:10:24.520 It's pretty pathetic. You know, my theory on all of that stuff is that because we've raised a

00:10:29.340 generation of people, it really troubles me when it comes to boys and men, but we've raised such a

00:10:35.060 generation of people who have really never been through any level of hardship that almost that

00:10:40.260 becomes their plight. I'm dealing with this and somebody said something about me or said

00:10:45.200 something that I disagree with and now I feel persecuted by that or bullied by that. When

00:10:50.600 really and truly, when you compare it to the grand scheme of things in both the world culture and

00:10:55.060 history, you didn't really go through that much of hardship. So it's like people are trying to find

00:10:59.420 their plight. You know, my wife, she wants to keep the temperature in the house set on, you know,

00:11:03.700 78 degrees. I want to keep it on about 68 degrees. And as much as we may disagree on that,

00:11:09.320 I still love my wife. You guys don't have big knockout, drag down fights over that, huh?

00:11:16.640 Exactly. So I'm not going to leave my wife over the thermostat. We've learned how to disagree on

00:11:21.260 the trivial things and the major things and still somehow managed to keep a marriage intact, you know?

00:11:26.200 So how do you reconcile then this thought that social media and being online and this inability to

00:11:32.060 disagree and some of the challenges with social media with you as a professional utilizing social

00:11:38.140 media to illustrate a point, to share a message and to get people talking? How do you find the

00:11:43.620 balance between that? I think the big thing is we have to remember that social media is not,

00:11:48.400 it's not real life. It's a, it's a platform. And to the degree that you can use that platform in a

00:11:54.860 healthy way, I think you'll be successful on social media. The problem comes when people make

00:12:01.700 that their soul outlet to the world, you know, they hide away and that's their form of communication.

00:12:08.000 And that's how they reach out to people. And that's the way they talk to people and they lose

00:12:13.100 touch. You know, imagine someone who spends their entire life in front of a computer or playing a

00:12:18.820 guitar or on a soundboard and they never really go out. I mean, they might be great at IT or great at

00:12:24.780 sound or great at music, but they've never taken the time to put an object aside long enough to

00:12:29.420 really interact with a human being. You and I, we've known those people. I know those people very

00:12:33.720 well. They're awkward socially. And I think we're getting that way. We're getting to a point where

00:12:38.680 we have confused reality with social media and people have gotten very awkward with each other.

00:12:43.560 And so now we have to express ourself in terms of things like hate and differences and political

00:12:49.960 parties and, you know, sexual orientations and all of these things. And now I have all of these

00:12:55.080 identity things that go on, you know, what's the color of my skin? What gender am I? All of these

00:13:01.100 deals rather than just being an individual with my own sense of self-worth. And social media has

00:13:05.760 kind of become in many ways, a downward spiral of civilization because of that.

00:13:10.140 As you were saying that, it reminds me of Tom Hanks in Castaway. And eventually what does he start

00:13:14.080 doing? He starts talking to a volleyball, right? Like he can't even interact with a human being and he

00:13:18.240 comes back and he's a weird dude, quite frankly. It's amazing to see people argue and then question,

00:13:23.500 would this individual ever say anything remotely close to what they just said in person? And the

00:13:29.720 answer is no, because they'd get punched in the teeth or worse. You know, we can hide behind this

00:13:33.940 anonymity and not have to worry about what other people feel, not have to see their reactions or

00:13:40.420 how it impacts them in their life or how they might respond to that. It's pretty sad when we don't have

00:13:45.540 that feedback of what is acceptable and what isn't in our social interactions.

00:13:50.160 Yeah. That's one reason I appreciate so much what you do and how you use your platform and the subject

00:13:56.380 matter. Because let's face it, I got five kids. I got three daughters, two sons. I want them to be

00:14:01.660 strong individuals. I want them to have a real sense of reality in life and what it's like to

00:14:07.180 be a part of the human race and to interact with people. And one of the things that I think is we've

00:14:13.700 raised a generation of weak people and we've raised a generation of weak young men without being real

00:14:20.900 fathers to them, without being real storytellers, without being able to pass that mantle of manhood

00:14:26.900 on. And it's becoming a major epidemic now. I mean, we can insultingly call people soy boys,

00:14:33.540 beta males and everything, tongue in cheek and all of these deals, but it really is becoming

00:14:37.460 a generation that doesn't know how to go out and provide, doesn't know how to go out and hunt and

00:14:41.980 gather because now it's been made taboo. To say that as a man, I'm a hunter gatherer and I'm going

00:14:47.480 to go out and provide for my family is almost, it's been labeled sexist. And so now people live in fear

00:14:53.560 of how they interact because they're fighting these hormonal gender tendencies that exist and are

00:15:00.740 biologically and scientifically real with a culture that says it's not okay to be that way.

00:15:06.320 And so people are struggling with that.

00:15:07.660 Do you think that society is trending that way? Do you think it's a vocal minority who's complaining

00:15:13.480 about quote unquote toxic masculinity and the like? Do you think this is a representation of the majority

00:15:18.440 of people? What is your take on that?

00:15:21.080 I don't think it's the representation of the majority of people, but I do think that it is the majority

00:15:25.560 of those who have the most vocal ability. So whether it's the mainstream media or Hollywood and how

00:15:32.000 they're painting masculinity and how they're expressing it, you know, with the advent of the

00:15:37.020 phrase such as toxic masculinity, which I don't, I think is an oxymoron. I don't think it exists. I

00:15:42.560 believe if you have masculinity, it's not toxic. And if it's toxic, it's not masculinity. I think that

00:15:48.300 those with the bigger voice, unfortunately, are the ones who are prevailing to the point of trying to

00:15:53.320 shape reality. But no, I don't think the average person out there across America or even around the

00:15:58.220 world has that overwhelming sense of that. I don't think that's where they live. And I, and I would

00:16:03.400 say, you know, I can't speak for Europe. I see trends in Europe that are a little more sticky than

00:16:09.280 maybe what we have here in America. I do comedy tours across the country. I go everywhere from

00:16:13.920 California to New York. I spend a lot of time in middle America and I spend most of my time with

00:16:18.300 middle Americans, whether it's in California or New York, these blue collar hard work and pull

00:16:22.880 yourself up by your bootstraps and blaze your own trail folks, these folks who work for a living. I mean,

00:16:27.380 they got a sense of values. I hear their voices and I hear their feedback and their opinions.

00:16:32.120 And I can assure you when it comes to their opinions, they still believe very much the

00:16:37.680 traditional model of masculinity and femininity and the nuclear family and how you raise children

00:16:43.180 and all of these things. But they also equally realize how much they're under attack and they're

00:16:47.420 being bombarded on a daily basis. The challenging thing with this is that that vocal minority, they

00:16:53.340 just love to squawk, right? The problem is, is that the majority of people who, and I believe

00:16:59.040 what you believe that, that the majority believe in that traditional idea of masculinity and how we

00:17:03.700 approach our role as men and fathers and husbands and community leaders and everything else is that

00:17:08.820 they're too busy doing their work and being those type of men to want to squawk and talk about this

00:17:13.400 stuff. And you don't have a counter argument to the chaos, the craziness that we hear online.

00:17:18.580 That's a great point. If you believe in something, I believe you should be able to defend it. If you

00:17:22.820 have a conviction, then you should be at least rhetorically reticent enough to know why you

00:17:29.020 believe it. And you should be able to express that because how are you going to pass that on to the

00:17:32.600 next generation if you can't at least tell the story of why? And I think you're right. I think we've

00:17:37.540 gotten so busy out there doing the role that we don't know how to define the role anymore. And that's

00:17:42.960 something that we're going to have to get good at, or we're going to lose it all together.

00:17:46.080 Whatever you believe in is always one generation away from extinction. So you got to be able to

00:17:50.900 raise that next generation up into the same convictions or it's going to be gone.

00:17:54.900 Yeah. I know one of the things that I personally struggle with, and this is hard because I'm in the

00:17:59.960 quote unquote business or the conversation of masculinity, but I even struggle in my role as

00:18:06.100 a father in teaching my sons and my one daughter about what it means to be a man and how even a woman

00:18:11.380 shows up as she grows into her femininity. I'm just so busy. I'm consumed with work and consumed

00:18:17.380 with activities and people are pulling on me for attention. And I've got other commitments that I

00:18:22.000 want to make sure that I hold and live up to. And I think that's pretty indicative of where most men

00:18:26.820 are, that they don't take the time to hit the pause button and sit down with their son or their

00:18:31.420 daughter and actually explain a lesson or see something where they do wrong. Instead of just

00:18:36.720 disciplining them, they won't actually take the time to sit down and let me explain this to you

00:18:41.400 why we don't behave this way or we don't act this way. And I think if we took more time to sit down,

00:18:48.320 to interact, to engage, to have conversations, to, like you said, to tell these stories,

00:18:53.800 we're going to pass that on a much more effectively than simply disciplining or

00:18:57.380 even worse, pawning our kids off to the school system or daycare.

00:19:00.900 And I really don't know any other way to say it better than that. What's the old adage that love

00:19:05.040 the spell T-I-M-E? And that's one of the things that it's hard to do. I'm generation X and I grew

00:19:12.700 up with baby boomer parents who created this phenomenon known as latchkey kids because they

00:19:18.440 were out so busy trying to provide for us that we came home to an empty house and the parents came

00:19:23.660 home and there might've been dinner and they sat in front of the TV until dad passed out in the

00:19:28.280 recliner. And the new generation is going to the other extreme where we're almost spoiling these kids

00:19:33.640 to death. And rather than giving them time and just the attention that they need, we're giving

00:19:39.400 them thanks. You know, what's the next Xbox or PlayStation or whatever? Because if I give you

00:19:45.380 that, you're going to get engaged in that. And now, you know, I don't have to spend that time with you

00:19:50.580 like I should. It's pretty convenient, isn't it? Yeah, it's really, it's, we're cursing ourselves

00:19:55.700 with irresponsibility. And what happens is we're raising a generation that second, twice as

00:20:00.660 irresponsible as us because we didn't take the time to, well, there you go. We didn't take the

00:20:05.240 time. How do we begin to correct some of the problems? You know, it's really, I shouldn't say

00:20:09.100 it's easy. The solution I think is simple within the walls of our home, right? We just spend more

00:20:13.080 time. We engage, we disconnect from the things that aren't as relevant or the priorities that we

00:20:18.900 should have. And we engage more with our youth, our children and kids in the community. It's very easy

00:20:24.100 to control this in our own lives. But how do we spread this message broadly so that more men are

00:20:31.740 interested in fixing themselves and fixing their homes and worrying about their neighbors and doing

00:20:36.740 all the things that we're talking about? Well, one of the big things that I've had a strong belief in

00:20:41.960 for a long time is that we have not called our boys into manhood. We tend to hang out in adolescent

00:20:47.400 behavior for a long time. And I think that we have got to be men ourselves. And by being men,

00:20:55.780 we take our boys under our wing and we show them, we teach them, we educate them. As you referred to

00:21:03.160 earlier, I don't entrust the public school system to teach my children what they should know. I don't

00:21:09.260 entrust the government or anybody else to do that. It's my responsibility to take them and to teach

00:21:16.200 them those convictions. And you got to unplug. Now more than ever, it's become harder and harder

00:21:21.460 because we're getting bombarded with bites and bits of information that are just throwing

00:21:26.260 themselves at us nonstop at the speed of thought almost these days. You know, we're never away from

00:21:32.420 the internet. Everybody's got their phone with them. You know, it's in their pocket, their purse,

00:21:36.540 in their hand or sitting on the toilet. I mean, remember the good old days we used to sit on the

00:21:40.460 toilet and read shampoo bottles. We put dirty joke books in our toilets. That's what we read.

00:21:46.200 Exactly. I mean, you know, we can't get away from the internet. We're being bombarded by it. So we're

00:21:51.380 also in the same time being bombarded with things that are so distracting that we forget our

00:21:56.360 responsibilities. So I think it's absolutely necessary for men to set aside time and say,

00:22:01.220 this is dedicated time. And we're going to, whether it's across the table during a meal,

00:22:05.900 or we're going to take a day and we're going to go out, we're going to do these things,

00:22:10.180 whether it's at the shooting range, it's at a place to go fishing or camping and part of,

00:22:15.400 you know, all these different things that we do historically, whether it's recreational or just

00:22:19.800 sitting, sitting down and having a conversation. I want to have, I want to talk with you. I want

00:22:23.380 to know where you're coming from. Unfortunately, men have lost that ability.

00:22:26.640 You know, I really want to go back to this thought of storytelling because you've said

00:22:29.360 that now a couple of times. And I would say you definitely fall into the camp of being a great

00:22:32.960 storyteller through, you know, the jokes that you tell and the quick videos that you share.

00:22:36.780 And even this podcast, how does one become, and specifically I'm talking about men,

00:22:41.240 because I think if you go back tens of thousands of years, this medium of communication,

00:22:45.500 telling stories around a campfire, for example, is how our young men learned. Here's how you hunt.

00:22:51.300 Here's what you do with the meat. Here's our job. Here's how we're going to defend the tribe

00:22:54.780 and the village. Here's how we're going to conquer and expand and grow and develop new ideas.

00:23:00.680 It was all done around a campfire telling stories. How does one become a better storyteller?

00:23:06.420 Sure. And let me say one other thing is I think you are probably pretty well known and recognized

00:23:11.000 for your ability to communicate very, very effectively. Is that something that you've

00:23:15.620 always had or have you really had to develop and work on this? I'll say this. I've always been able

00:23:20.520 to run my mouth, but maybe not effectively. You know what I mean? That's a learning thing too,

00:23:24.900 right? How do you run it effectively? Yeah. So I, a long time ago, I'm 46 years old now. I got to a

00:23:30.620 point where I wanted to learn how to effectively tell a story because let's face it, human history was

00:23:35.980 shaped not by a telephone or television, but by tell a person. And so to that degree that we could

00:23:42.100 effectively carry on and pass down a story to the next generation, the values of the generations

00:23:47.440 prior were going to exist and live. That was most effectively done through a story, whether it was

00:23:52.260 an oral story or something written on a cave wall or an Egyptian hieroglyphic. Well, these days,

00:23:57.280 in many ways, we're still putting our stories on a wall. It just happens to be a digital wall called

00:24:01.580 social media. And there's all these various ways that we can do it. And that's one of the reasons

00:24:05.720 I wanted to utilize story when it came to using this type of platform, whether it's podcast,

00:24:11.180 television, or social. So every story has a beginning, middle, and end. And there needs to be

00:24:16.540 a crisis in there. Every good story has a crisis. You might have a good person. You might have a bad

00:24:21.080 person that's in there, or it might just be circumstantially. That's what causes the crisis.

00:24:25.340 You got a boy who sets off on a journey. He faces some obstacles. There's some things he's got

00:24:29.640 to overcome. And by enduring and persevering, that's where he gets to. And the end of the story,

00:24:33.760 he has success. And there should be a moral to the story. And this is what he learned.

00:24:38.320 And I think that that's what we're failing to do with our kids in this next generation,

00:24:42.500 is teaching them that there is a crisis, that there is going to be a lot of things you're going

00:24:47.500 to come against. A lot of obstacles are there. You've got to face those things. You've got to endure

00:24:52.700 those things if you're going to get any success in life. I just encourage people,

00:24:57.100 one of the best ways that you can communicate with your kids or with your wife or with your

00:25:01.820 friends is to tell a story. And guys traditionally are good at that. We're naturally good at that

00:25:06.620 because how many times you've been sitting around a group of guys and one guy tells a story and the

00:25:11.320 next guy says, oh, well, I can beat that. He's going to tell a bigger story with a bigger crisis

00:25:16.220 and a bigger catharsis. And so on and on and on it goes. I think when you tell those stories,

00:25:21.140 those are the best ways, one, to pass it on to the next generation. And they're also going to be

00:25:25.140 the most memorable ways because it's the power of story. If I tell you to memorize a Bible verse

00:25:30.280 somewhere, you're going to have trouble with that. But if I tell you to tell me the gingerbread

00:25:34.240 high across the lake, you can remember that from childhood. Yeah, 100%. I mean, this has actually

00:25:39.220 been a challenge for me because I tend to be so black and white. Here's the problem. Here's the

00:25:42.540 solution. Ready, go. And for me to take the time to back up and actually articulate a story or

00:25:47.080 something I've been through personally that's anecdotal that may help my son or a friend get through

00:25:53.120 whatever it is they're dealing with. It's certainly been something I've struggled with and definitely

00:25:56.960 had to work on and improve my ability to tell these stories. But they are very, very powerful.

00:26:01.260 You ever notice how we are with our wives and even our daughters a lot of times? Because my wife,

00:26:06.440 she tells a very long story. I'm like, get to the point, lady. Let's bottom line this thing.

00:26:12.900 Because I'm like you, I tend to be a bottom line kind of person. If you come to me with a problem,

00:26:17.560 I'm going to just tell you the solution. I don't care how you feel about it. And I'm not going to

00:26:21.700 keep asking you, how does that make you feel? I'm not your therapist. I'm a dude. And that

00:26:25.460 frustrates our wives. You know, I know that it frustrates mine because a lot of times people

00:26:29.920 don't want their problems solved. They want them understood. If we can tell them a story that goes

00:26:34.520 along those lines, then it makes a huge, huge difference and saves us from some pretty heavy

00:26:39.040 arguments with our spouses. No doubt. I know every man who's listening to this right now is shaking

00:26:43.760 his head like, yeah, I've always got the answer, but she doesn't want to hear that answer. And that

00:26:48.480 is a very, very frustrating thing. But you talk about it from a great perspective, which is this

00:26:52.680 level of empathy, right? And that's understanding what she might need and understanding what that

00:26:57.780 she may not be looking for the solution. But what's interesting, and I've heard you talk about this

00:27:02.520 before is that there's this idea out there that somehow we believe that masculinity is the suppression

00:27:08.900 of emotions or the suppression of the ability to relate with or understand other people. But I think

00:27:14.500 you've got a pretty good handle and understanding that that's not what it means to be a man. Can

00:27:20.300 you speak about man's ability to tap into how maybe he does feel or how other people feel and utilize that

00:27:26.140 for being a better man? Men want to be men for whatever that means. You know, men want to feel

00:27:31.780 masculine. They want to feel strong. They want to be attractive to the opposite sex. They want to be

00:27:36.460 able to bend the steel bars, whatever, you know. You know, Superman is that comic book epitome of what

00:27:42.400 every man wants to be, wants to save the day, right? And unfortunately, sometimes we fail in our

00:27:48.120 attempts to be masculine because we're trying too hard and we're trying to accomplish too much. I need

00:27:54.060 to be stronger to the next guy, smarter than the next guy, more successful. I need to drive a better

00:27:58.240 car. My truck needs to be taller, bigger. My bank account needs to be more robust and, you know, all of

00:28:03.500 these things. I don't know that necessarily women look at that so much in a man. If so, then they aren't

00:28:10.920 real women. The feminine in them is flawed in many ways, just like the masculine in us gets flawed.

00:28:17.580 But I think true masculinity finds ways to support the real feminine, and I think the real feminine

00:28:23.960 finds ways to support and boost the real masculine. Because let's face it, men find their self-worth,

00:28:29.940 sense of self-worth in a scene in two different things, how they're able to relate to their women

00:28:34.260 and how they're able to relate to their work. And to the degree that both of those things are messed up

00:28:40.100 and fail, then men are going to have self-worth issues. They're really going to have problems.

00:28:44.620 So how many times have you seen a guy either get fired or he is frustrated with work and finds

00:28:49.820 himself in depression or his wife leaves him with a Dear John letter or whatever. Now he's ready to

00:28:55.260 end it all because, you know, he doesn't have, he's got no sense of worth anymore because he's lost his

00:29:00.060 woman in his work. It hits home on one of the things that we talk about a lot, which is a man's

00:29:04.200 ability to provide. You know, I've talked with men who are out of work for a whole myriad of reasons,

00:29:09.180 whether it's because they're, they're injured or disabled, all kinds of reasons. They got laid off

00:29:13.720 expansions or outsourcing. They have a very, very difficult time because they feel inadequate.

00:29:20.360 They feel incapable of providing, which to your point earlier, I think we are biologically hardwired

00:29:26.320 to be the providers of society. If you feel like a hunter gatherer, you know, you're the one who

00:29:32.520 leaves the cave, goes out, you bring home what you killed and you provide for your family,

00:29:37.460 you build the fire, blah, blah, blah, you know, and that takes it back to a caveman mentality.

00:29:42.040 But we all understand what that means. You get up in the morning, you go to work, you come home,

00:29:46.580 you do everything you can to provide. And suddenly that is taken away from you for whatever reason.

00:29:52.240 You've in a sense lost so much of all of your ability to exist. I mean, you've lost all your

00:29:58.260 worthiness in your mind. And that is a huge thing that men have to deal with.

00:30:02.760 It can be challenging because it ends up being a big circle, a big cycle, right? Somebody loses

00:30:08.180 their ability to be the provider that they see themselves as. They get into this state of

00:30:13.160 depression or despair, which further hinders their ability to provide and causes more problems. And

00:30:20.120 at that point, it just becomes self-fulfilling prophecy. So how does a man begin to get himself

00:30:24.960 out of this cycle of despair and not being able to provide?

00:30:28.400 The advice I've given to not only other men, but to myself is that the first thing you've got to do

00:30:35.160 is you've got to establish your own sense of identity. See, I believe that the most liberating

00:30:41.200 thing that a man can do for himself is understand who he is and figure out why he was created and what

00:30:49.000 sound he's supposed to make in the earth. I should not need external things to validate my existence.

00:30:56.460 I am created to live inside to outside. So you take it back to the Garden of Eden. Use that as an

00:31:02.920 example. Here, God creates Adam and says, I'm going to give you everything you need. And the book of

00:31:10.700 Genesis says that God would come speaking in the soul of the day, talking in the cool of the day,

00:31:17.220 the nefesh, which is the word for the soul. And basically, God was coming to tutor Adam. He was

00:31:22.660 coming to fill him with knowledge, fill him with wisdom, all these things, these things that were

00:31:26.300 on the inside. You know, God was basically mentoring Adam. But then all of a sudden, what

00:31:30.860 happened? Eve comes to him with the fruit of the tree and satisfies him with something from the

00:31:35.100 outside, and his whole life is thrust into shambles. So he goes from fulfilling himself inside to

00:31:40.780 outside to outside to inside, and now that's what we're doing. Our life is now made up in terms of its

00:31:46.520 context and circumstances. Everything we do now is, how can I add more things to my life? Do I get a

00:31:52.580 bigger job? Do I get a better job? Do I get a promotion? Do I become the boss? Am I managing?

00:31:56.980 Am I making more money? Do I have a boat now? Can I get a camper? Do we have jet skis? Bigger house?

00:32:02.440 Do we need three car garages? So now your life is measured in terms of what you have on the outside.

00:32:07.940 So I always say to guys, and I have to remind myself, your life is not defined by the outside. It's got to

00:32:13.640 be defined by what's inside of you. Once you have that identity, then whatever circumstantially can

00:32:19.720 happen to you outside of that, it doesn't change ultimately who you are as a man.

00:32:24.840 I like this thought. I even like that you're going that far back because it almost, it speaks to me

00:32:28.620 and it says, this is in our nature a little bit to start looking for external sources of validation.

00:32:34.800 And I think the awareness of that, being aware of the fact that we are looking for external validation

00:32:39.380 is probably the first step to combating our desire to continually do that. You have to be aware of it.

00:32:46.840 I think there's a lot of people out there who just aren't aware of what's actually going on. And

00:32:51.580 because they're seeking that external validation and they don't know how or why it just continues

00:32:56.500 to play out as a script that, that will inevitably produce the same results, which is depression and

00:33:02.760 anxiety and loneliness and a feeling of inadequacy, which we know we see in men in very, very alarming

00:33:09.560 and increasing rates. Yeah. And at what point in time is enough enough? I mean, you never have

00:33:15.060 enough. It's like putting your money in a purse that has a hole in the bottom. You can never fill

00:33:19.860 the thing up. So if that's what's going to validate you, you will never be satisfied. There's not enough

00:33:25.900 money. There's not enough things. There's not enough relationships. That's why guys tend to live in terms

00:33:30.760 of conquest. You know, how many notches on the bedpost can I, you know, how much of a playboy can

00:33:35.460 I be? And they're not satisfied with, you know, their wife. They're not satisfied with their life.

00:33:41.240 They're not satisfied with their income. There's just never enough. You're exactly right with that.

00:33:45.960 I also think this, this is a, uh, I was going to say a young man's game, but that's not the right

00:33:49.760 term. I would say this is an immature man's game, right? Because it's not about age. Cause I know

00:33:53.860 guys who are 50 years old, who are still living like my 10 year old son when it comes to, you know,

00:33:58.240 what, what they're entertained by. For example, this speaks back to what we were talking about

00:34:02.440 earlier. It's our job to not only mature for ourselves, which is the maturity to realize

00:34:07.700 that I am enough, or I can be enough through my own internal work, but then also passing those

00:34:13.260 lessons on and helping foster our young men and usher them into manhood and teach them that it's not

00:34:21.660 about the sexual conquest. Although sex is an important part of being a man. Amen. It's right.

00:34:27.260 It's not about dominating everybody else and winning at their expense. It's about teamwork and

00:34:32.800 dominating, but teamwork and working together with other people. This is a more mature,

00:34:37.240 sophisticated way of looking at masculinity. Back to your point. I've always referred to it

00:34:41.620 as an adolescent man's game. I, you know, you remember when you hit adolescence and all of a

00:34:45.940 sudden your hormones were raging and you didn't know what to do. And you had the playboy hidden in

00:34:50.080 the bushes out in the woods and you snuck out there to find it. We're the same way, you know,

00:34:54.260 we're still trying to sneak around to find our thrill. And a lot of guys, unfortunately,

00:34:58.760 they want to become more and more successful because that just, what's the old adage? You

00:35:02.460 know, the bigger the boys, the bigger the toys. Well, the more money you get, then the more,

00:35:05.840 you know, crazy things you can go out there and do. And then all of a sudden now you're in

00:35:10.000 Las Vegas and you got STDs. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there's some very real consequences to this.

00:35:16.300 Yeah. As you said, it's a never ending cycle. It just doesn't satisfy itself.

00:35:21.620 What would you say is your sense of identity? How would you define that for yourself? If some

00:35:27.560 more to ask you that question. First and foremost, I learned to be content

00:35:31.580 in many ways. And my definition of contentment, you know, the apostle Paul said in the book of

00:35:36.800 Philippians, he said, I've learned to abound and I've learned to be abased. I've learned to be rich

00:35:41.040 and I've learned to be poor, but in whatsoever situation I find myself, I've learned to be content.

00:35:45.480 And my definition of that is you learn to sit down on the inside. The first key to my identity is

00:35:52.540 I'm not struggling to be something I'm not. I want to be comfortable in my own skin.

00:35:58.220 I know my limitations. I know my strengths. I try to play to those and I try to build my weaknesses.

00:36:04.320 There are things about me that I don't like. There's things about myself I do like,

00:36:08.280 but I'm not striving. You know, I'm sitting in a room right now in our studios. I got

00:36:12.540 five other men in the room with me. I don't spend my time comparing myself to those men.

00:36:17.600 I admire them. I see their strengths and appreciate what they bring to the table,

00:36:22.020 but I'm not threatened by them. In fact, I look at myself secure enough as to let those men

00:36:26.220 complete me. I'm not threatened by that. That's really, really important. And I think

00:36:31.480 somebody who isn't there yet, I feel like I'm getting there. It's been a long journey for me as well.

00:36:36.600 I think a lot of it just comes with age and maturity. I think a lot of it comes down to

00:36:41.060 the actions, right? The things that you're doing on a daily basis, whether it's working out or

00:36:46.100 making the sales calls or having the conversation, the difficult conversation,

00:36:50.080 you start to prove to yourself enough that you're capable of doing these things that maybe you were

00:36:55.640 afraid of doing. And I think that's how you build this level of confidence that can't be

00:36:59.120 replicated any other way. Yeah. There's something to be said for the idea of risk. You know,

00:37:04.240 so many men spend their time, they line up the rifle and it's ready, aim, aim, aim, aim, aim,

00:37:09.320 and they never pull the trigger. Sometimes you got to jump out of the plane. My late friend,

00:37:13.200 James Ryle, he used to have a great four points that I've kind of adopted as my own. And I've used

00:37:18.540 them all over the country about having vision, which leads to passion, which leads to discipline,

00:37:23.260 which leads to risk. And if you have risk without discipline, it's recklessness. And if you have

00:37:28.600 discipline without passion, it's legalism. If you have passion without vision,

00:37:32.620 it's just hype and cheerleading. But if you have vision without faith, it's meaningless. And you

00:37:38.280 need to have faith in yourself. You need to have faith. I believe in God and faith in those around

00:37:43.300 you. And when you have that kind of faith, you can risk some things. You can fail and it's okay

00:37:48.880 because the failure, you learn from it, you pick yourself up and you live again to risk more.

00:37:53.840 Risk is such an interesting thing too, because it does pose some very serious threats. If you're not

00:37:58.940 taking calculated risks and you're not doing it thoughtfully, you're being reckless and you could

00:38:04.680 potentially expose yourself to all kinds of problems. Yeah. Yeah. How do you know when you're

00:38:09.380 ready for, or when you should take some level of risk, whether it's sharing something on social media

00:38:15.640 that you feel or having the difficult conversation or walking into your boss's office and asking for a

00:38:20.520 raise? Like when do you know you're ready to assume some level of risk? Go back to that idea of

00:38:26.200 identity. Your identity sets the pace for your destiny and where you're going. If you catch a

00:38:31.860 vision for your life, let's say, you know, I really think this is who I am and this is the direction

00:38:36.240 for my life. Well, once you get a vision and when I say vision, and I know that it's God, it's so

00:38:41.820 overused, but it's, it's seeing beyond the boundaries of your life. For instance, my vision, I want to see

00:38:48.040 generationally. I want to live beyond my years. So I want to make sure that I'm imparting to the next

00:38:53.000 generation. I want to live bigger than I am. You're living bigger than you are because you just

00:38:58.080 look at the podcast, look at the organizations and the mission and the purpose that you're involved

00:39:02.580 with. You're influencing a lot of people. So you caught a vision that was bigger than the confines

00:39:08.620 of your immediate surroundings and you embrace that. And so you disciplined yourself. You got

00:39:13.800 passionate about it. You disciplined yourself to say, okay, this is what I'm going to do. This is my

00:39:18.200 voice. This is what I'm going to put out there. And now, Hey, once those things are in place,

00:39:23.600 I'm going to risk it. And people are going to disagree with me. People are going to criticize

00:39:27.900 me. They're going to judge me. You know, I put a post out yesterday that a lot of people hate.

00:39:33.040 My mother even got mad at me about it, but you know what? I mean, it's what I do. And I've never put

00:39:38.580 anything out that did not offend somebody that didn't bother somebody or wasn't how they would have said it.

00:39:44.760 And I love what you said, a calculated risk. It's not reckless. I know who I am. And now I'm putting

00:39:50.300 this out into the world on the basis of who I am. And I think when you do that, you're going to be

00:39:55.160 far more successful than failing. That's really interesting. I never thought about it. Cause one

00:39:59.040 of the things we talk about quite a bit is that in order to build confidence, you're going to have

00:40:02.600 to exhibit some level of courage, right? You're going to have to put yourself out there and do

00:40:06.220 something that's unknown and or scary. That's the nature of it. That's the deal. If you're content to

00:40:11.100 stay in the cave and live in the cave and tend the fires, your history is not going to be very

00:40:16.520 kind to you. And also history is not going to really even know your name. So what's the point?

00:40:21.660 And even for me, you know, I think about legacy and, you know, we get wrapped up sometimes in

00:40:26.480 thinking, okay, I want history to remember me. Of course I want to make that level of impact.

00:40:29.780 But at the same time, I want it to be remembered through the eyes and hearts of, of, of the people

00:40:35.320 that I really have an intimate relationship with. For example, my wife and my sons and daughter,

00:40:40.440 that's my legacy is what type of life will they live because they were exposed to me?

00:40:46.360 Not so much the name itself, but the lessons and the interactions and the way they view the world

00:40:50.720 and the way they think about risk and the way they look at hard work and all the other virtues that

00:40:55.420 I'm trying to instill upon them. And that's the perfect way to wrap up that entire thing.

00:41:00.620 Identity leads to destiny and destiny leads to legacy. I always use these biblical illustrations

00:41:06.080 because there's some great stories in the Bible and there's some great lessons to be learned from

00:41:11.100 that. There's this pretty obscure verse that talks about King David of Israel, who it says that he

00:41:16.360 built instruments to play before the Lord. It's one thing to be able to play an instrument. It's

00:41:21.600 another thing to be able to build an instrument. It's another thing altogether, even still to build an

00:41:27.140 instrument that has never existed before. You just have this sound in your heart and you're like,

00:41:32.800 well, there's nothing to play that. So I'm going to build something that makes that sound. It's

00:41:37.020 interesting that David did that. And what I find is that I think that, you know, David looked at his

00:41:41.760 arsenal of instruments and he says, well, there's nothing to create the sound I want in my heart.

00:41:45.680 I look at that and I say, I think that God created us. He looked in the earth and said,

00:41:50.080 there's nobody to make a sound. So I'm going to make Orion or I'm going to make a Chad. And then to the

00:41:56.180 degree that you can make that sound, you were created to make, you're fulfilling your identity and

00:42:00.940 your destiny. And then you pass that sound on to the next generation and then you've built a legacy.

00:42:06.800 And now your children are making that sound in the earth as well. It's unique, but it has the

00:42:12.340 hints of your vocal tones in it. You know what I'm saying? And then once you have that, I'm telling

00:42:16.900 you, it's going to pass from generation to generation. That's a very, very interesting thought.

00:42:21.240 I actually wrote down here as I was preparing to have this conversation, I can't remember where I saw it,

00:42:26.040 but I had made the note that we have a responsibility to speak up. I must've seen that in a video or on

00:42:31.340 your website or somewhere. Can you speak to me about that? Because I think that is in line with

00:42:35.500 what you're talking about here when it comes to creating a voice, identifying what that is,

00:42:39.560 and then creating a sound and putting it out into the world that we have a responsibility to do that.

00:42:43.960 Well, like everything else, there's a balance. You know, there's a time to speak and a time to

00:42:47.640 be quiet. There's valid principles in that. I think that out of the abundance of your heart,

00:42:54.820 out of that identity, out of that sense of destiny. If you don't speak up, if I know that

00:43:00.080 that's the sound I'm supposed to make, then I am actually violating the reason I was created.

00:43:06.280 If I don't speak up, I am very much pro men and masculinity. I'm very much pro life. I lean

00:43:14.520 conservative in many ways. I'm very pro patriotic. I'm pro America. And so when I have that opportunity

00:43:21.140 to speak up, I'm pro justice, pro law enforcement and first responders and military, those are the

00:43:27.240 things I feel very passionately about. And so I know that if I don't speak up when I have a platform

00:43:32.920 and opportunity to do that, then I'm violating myself. And so that's why people say, you know,

00:43:38.400 if you could go back and do what you do, you know, you've taken a lot of heat, a lot of criticism

00:43:42.500 over the years. Would you go back and do it all again? Of course, because I just did it out of

00:43:47.360 the abundance of who I am. Gentlemen, time out real quick. Just want to hit the pause

00:43:52.440 button. I want to talk with you about the iron council. All right. This is a powerful band of

00:43:56.120 brothers. We're all working together. I say we, because I'm very, very active and engaged there,

00:44:00.340 but we're working together to make a difference in the lives of the men inside ourselves and our

00:44:04.500 brothers. And this month we're talking all about the concept of being a lighthouse, a lighthouse in your

00:44:09.880 family, business, and community. And so to that end, we have all of our members, complete

00:44:15.420 assignments and worksheets, participate in up to eight challenges a month, and then hold each

00:44:21.040 other accountable to our most pressing concerns and objectives. So if you feel like you've been in

00:44:25.360 a bit of a holding pattern, we're getting into or close to the second quarter of the year,

00:44:29.600 but you feel like you've been there for any amount of time, knowing that you want more out of life and

00:44:34.840 more out of your performance, then the iron council represents the jolt, or maybe even the jumpstart

00:44:39.700 that you'll need to get yourself on a different, more successful track. And the truth is men,

00:44:45.420 need to surround themselves with other men. And the iron council represents the opportunity and the

00:44:50.740 framework to do just that. So if you're interested, you want to learn more, head to

00:44:54.560 orderaman.com slash iron council. Again, orderaman.com slash iron council. Gentlemen, do that after the

00:45:00.740 show. Right now, we'll get back to my conversation with Chad. How did you overcome the naysayers and the

00:45:07.000 hate and the hostility and critics? And, you know, I think that comes gradually, right? Because nobody

00:45:12.520 knows you when you first get started in sharing this sound that you make, for example, and you

00:45:16.940 gradually build up the thick skin, but what did you do to overcome some of the, I don't like using the

00:45:22.160 term hate, but using the, the dissenting voice, if you will, that you have to deal with every day.

00:45:27.700 I'm still overcoming it in a lot of ways, you know, you're still overcoming it because first of all,

00:45:34.520 I consider the source. I've learned to consider the source. Who is it that's saying it?

00:45:38.960 If a total stranger calls me a racist, I'm going to ignore that. But if a good friend were to call

00:45:44.360 me a racist, I would consider that. I'd say, what is it that I'm doing that, that would make you say

00:45:48.580 that? It's funny. We can flip through a thousand positive responses and see one negative. And what

00:45:54.860 do we gravitate towards? Of course, naturally. I do have a tendency to have a little bit of natural

00:46:01.160 thick skin, but I also, I think the biggest thing is considering the source. You know, people can

00:46:06.500 criticize me and say these things to me, but at the end of the day, I don't know you and you don't

00:46:11.320 know me. And you're judging me off of a very small amount of verbiage that I put out into the world

00:46:18.580 that you happen to maybe disagree with. And so you wanted to take those words and judge the content

00:46:23.800 of my character, which is invalid. So I'm going to also invalidate what you're saying about me.

00:46:29.220 Yeah, that's a good point. I mean, you just qualify it. Is this a credible source? And you know what,

00:46:33.240 even if it's something you don't want to hear, if it's a credible source, like a friend, like you had

00:46:37.080 mentioned, then I think there's probably a case to be made that we should listen to that. And we

00:46:41.840 should consider that in the way that we interact on a day-to-day basis.

00:46:45.660 My big thing right now that I keep saying over and over again is if I'm very strong in my convictions,

00:46:51.080 then if somebody challenges those convictions, then they either A, will only solidify my convictions,

00:46:57.860 or they will challenge them to the point where I'll rethink them, which that's always a healthy

00:47:02.600 thing. That means I'm not rigid. I not only consider the sources, but I do pay attention

00:47:07.340 to what people say if it's valid. Regardless of the outcome, it's a win. You get better and

00:47:12.060 you improve your defense or you solidify your conviction, or you learn something new and now

00:47:16.340 you're a more well-rounded human being. And both are, I think most rational people would consider a

00:47:21.360 win. Yeah, it's win-win. I agree. What's your thoughts on political correctness? Because obviously

00:47:26.820 I would say that you are not politically correct in that you're willing to talk about things that

00:47:30.860 other people are afraid to talk about or get upset about. What's your thoughts about what this PC

00:47:36.160 culture means and how it has impacted us societally? I despise it to the point of almost thinking it is

00:47:43.800 demonically inspired. I really do. I despise political correctness. I think that it is an absolute war on

00:47:50.640 thought. I think it's a war on conviction. I think it's a war on manhood and womanhood. I think it's

00:47:56.920 an attack on culture and it's an attack on words to the degree that people can control words. They

00:48:03.260 can control society and culture. So I'm opposed to it. Now, I am not a person who's actively looking

00:48:10.140 to offend someone with the words I use. So I'm not trying to use hate speech for the sake of hate

00:48:16.180 speech. And I don't use hate speech, first of all, but I'm also not going to mix words. If a man is a man,

00:48:21.760 I'm going to call him a man. If a man is a woman. I know where you're coming. Yeah, I know where you're

00:48:27.040 going with this. I mean, it's one of those deals where you choose to live your life how you want

00:48:32.560 to choose it. I'm going to choose to interpret what I see in the words that I know have import

00:48:38.920 and meaning. And I'm not going to all of a sudden start changing everything on the basis of how you

00:48:45.160 feel about it. So if you ask me, I'm going to give you a direct response and that's just how it's

00:48:50.220 going to be. I just don't understand this political correctness stuff. And hey, you're

00:48:54.360 never going to win that game because they're going to keep changing it. First, it was a person was

00:48:58.280 disabled and then they were handicapped and then they were handicapable. And now it's,

00:49:02.520 I don't even know what it is now. I mean, you're never going to be able to say the right thing.

00:49:06.620 Well, and what's funny about this is if you actually talk with somebody who's quote unquote

00:49:09.840 disabled or the term you want to use, they don't really care as much as other people care about it.

00:49:15.260 I've got a friend who he's a double amputee. So missing both of his legs, he's like, yeah,

00:49:20.420 I don't know, disabled, like whatever you want to use. It doesn't really matter. Like they're not

00:49:24.100 nearly as sensitive as these superhero quote unquote superhero people that are trying to

00:49:28.740 save everybody. It's a no win situation. So to the degree you control language, you control the

00:49:35.360 rhetoric, you control the culture. And so I oppose it in a big, big way. You know, what's fascinating

00:49:40.340 about this though, is, you know, you're talking about regulating and controlling speech,

00:49:43.680 which I happen to agree is certainly we don't want a path to go down that path. But what's

00:49:48.120 interesting is when you talk about it, you're just trying to control my speech. It's like, no,

00:49:51.740 I'm, I'm actually just disagreeing with you. Right? So we've got to understand and use some logic here

00:49:56.720 that a disagreement doesn't mean that I'm trying to control your voice. It just means that I do

00:50:01.300 disagree with you. And this goes back to what we were talking about earlier is just having the

00:50:05.100 ability to disagree without thinking that this guy is personally attacking me. You know, if you and I

00:50:10.040 on this podcast and conversation had a disagreement, I wouldn't think that you were coming after me.

00:50:14.380 I would think, oh, he has a different viewpoint because he has a different set of experiences that

00:50:18.280 have caused him to believe that way and vice versa. What an amazing concept, isn't it?

00:50:22.980 Right. We grow from that. We develop. Disagree with people all the time. Doesn't mean I love

00:50:27.140 them any less. It's, you know, my wife, she rolls her eyes constantly to me. I bet she does. I can

00:50:33.040 imagine what that's like. I want to stay on this a little bit longer because I do believe it is so,

00:50:37.600 so important that we talk about this. And I also think too, is that when we talk about standing up

00:50:41.700 and making a stand for these things, we're actually in a way defending what is actually

00:50:45.720 important, or maybe I should say defending what we believe is important. And every cause needs to have

00:50:52.220 a champion. Every idea, maybe not every idea, but our ideas anyways, right? Need to have this,

00:50:58.220 have this champion, right? We need to defend these things because who else is going to do it?

00:51:02.000 I know that some of us want to go on this crusade where we try to fix everything,

00:51:06.000 but I think we get back to that identity issue. What am I called to speak out against? You know,

00:51:11.560 what am I called to say? You know, you go back, Martin Luther King Jr., he had one MO. His idea was

00:51:18.040 nonviolent protest. I read a biography recently about MLK, and he said, he told the White House,

00:51:24.580 he said, look, you guys can do it my way and the way we're recommending, or there's this other guy

00:51:29.480 over here named Malcolm X, and he has a completely other agenda of how he wants to fix the same problem.

00:51:35.480 Those guys, because they came at things from two very different angles, accomplished a lot

00:51:42.000 in the way they did. But MLK had his mission based on his identity, and Malcolm X the same from a whole

00:51:49.460 completely different angle. I think it's to the degree that you can find who you are and how you're

00:51:53.880 supposed to use that voice, and then you become the champion for that cause based on your own

00:51:58.100 individuality. Let's make the distinction here because we've used identity in a couple of different

00:52:02.600 ways. You're talking about finding your identity, finding out who you are and how you see and view

00:52:06.880 yourself in the world that you interact in. And then on the other side, and earlier in the

00:52:10.780 conversation, you talked about identity being this idea of identity politics, right? That I fit into

00:52:16.080 a group that I identify as straight or white or black or gay or transsexual or Democrat or liberal or

00:52:24.040 whatever. It sounds like based on that idea of identity, you see that as a problem. Can you walk me

00:52:30.360 through that and explain that to me? Let's go back to what I was saying earlier about are you living

00:52:34.480 inside to outside or are you living outside to inside? Are you living internally or are you living

00:52:39.240 externally? So when I say identity, I'm talking about who you are fundamentally on the inside,

00:52:44.740 who you are to the soul of your being. This is who you are. When God put his finger on your

00:52:50.000 lifeless DNA and said, boom, I'm creating a Chad Prather and this is who he's going to be,

00:52:55.440 is the voice he's going to have. That's one thing. But when you're trying to make everybody

00:53:00.360 succumb to your idea of identity based on externals, so what is your skin color? At the end of the day,

00:53:07.600 people shouldn't care what your skin color is. You're talking about 0.0001% of a difference

00:53:14.300 in DNA structure that changes the melatonin of somebody's skin pigmentation. We are fundamentally

00:53:20.340 the same as human beings. Why am I going to create an identity out of something that is so benign?

00:53:27.340 But listen, everybody's done it. We've had hate. We've had organizations. Think of how many

00:53:33.660 organizations have existed throughout history on the basis of hate for skin color. And so identity

00:53:39.300 politics wants to take external expression, external existence, external appearance and make an identity

00:53:45.940 out of it. And I think we're really messing up because it's living outside the inside. So here's the

00:53:51.500 thing. Whoever and however gets to judge this, let's say we suddenly woke up one day and said,

00:53:57.340 you know what? In America, we have achieved racial equality and racial justice. Now, I say that tongue

00:54:03.460 in cheek because I just don't think people are ever going to sit down and say, yep, we reached it. We

00:54:07.580 made it. We did it. People are always going to come up with something else that is an injustice.

00:54:13.480 People need to be victimized and they're always victimized on the basis of an external thing.

00:54:18.280 Oh, well, I don't have the same sexual orientation as you. Therefore, I'm being persecuted for it.

00:54:23.500 Maybe you are. Maybe you aren't. That's why I think that that gets dangerous when it gets to

00:54:27.640 identity politics. I think one of the other traps, and I agree with everything you said there,

00:54:31.920 and my wife and I were actually talking about this, is that you could have an issue with somebody and

00:54:36.780 it could be a relevant issue. And yet they might identify that issue as being tied up into race or

00:54:43.200 sexual orientation. And so they're completely misconstruing what you have an issue with.

00:54:47.780 If somebody's an a-hole, they're an a-hole. It doesn't mean that I'm picking on you because

00:54:52.120 you're black or white or purple or whatever else. It just means I don't like you because

00:54:54.900 you're an a-hole. And what that does is that creates a false sense of reality. And now nobody

00:54:59.700 knows what to operate on. Like, so is asshole behavior tolerable because it comes from somebody

00:55:05.760 of color or it's different rules for different people now. And that creates a real, real problem in

00:55:11.060 society. I spent a large portion of my life in my 20s and 30s in West Africa. I know what it's like

00:55:18.540 to be the only white guy within miles and miles and miles. And you feel isolated, you feel alone,

00:55:24.240 and you want to go out and you want to relate to these people on the basis of, well, the whole reason

00:55:29.340 you're there, you're there because you love them, you're there for compassion, you're there to help

00:55:32.840 them, but you're still being identified by an external. That gets frustrating. And we all, let's face it,

00:55:39.440 we all deal with those externals because I can't just pull my heart out, lay it on the table and tell you

00:55:44.780 that, you know, here's my heart, look at it. I've got to try to express that using words. If those words

00:55:49.800 are being controlled and taken away from me, it gets harder and harder for me to do that. And so now if I

00:55:55.340 can't use my words and I can't use my emotions and you're not going to believe them based on my

00:55:59.420 external identity and how I appear as a white heterosexual Christian male in America, it's a no-win

00:56:05.940 situation. I have nothing else to go on because now you won't listen to me. You won't trust my

00:56:10.580 feelings and you won't, you know, listen to my words. You're just looking at the outside of me.

00:56:14.660 So it gets pretty hard for everybody to communicate when it comes to that.

00:56:18.820 Yeah. I think the other problem too, is sometimes I see people will say things or have the ideas that

00:56:23.320 we have to completely ignore some very obvious things. Like somebody happens to be a different

00:56:28.360 shade of skin color, right? Or, or somebody has a different sexual orientation and we're supposed to now

00:56:33.480 maybe ignore that completely. It's like, we don't have to ignore it. Like we can recognize

00:56:37.560 that it's there, but we don't need to make decisions based on how that is. I should say

00:56:44.140 solely on those external factors. It's a challenge that every single one of us has to face as individuals

00:56:51.200 because let's face it, everybody's coming from a different place. We've all got different experiences.

00:56:57.580 Some grew up in a home with both parents. Some grew up with one parent. Some grew up with no

00:57:02.240 parents, broken homes, together homes. Some grew up with sickness, illness, all these things.

00:57:07.760 We're all coming from a different place. There is no level playing field. There's no such thing as

00:57:12.540 fair. Life isn't. We're all on this journey together, trying to be as successful at life as

00:57:19.300 we possibly can be realizing we've only got one of them. You know, we want to live beyond ourselves

00:57:24.340 because we want to, you know, pass ourselves on to the next generation as well and leave a mark,

00:57:29.780 something that was evidence that we were ever here. So it's, it's a challenge.

00:57:34.740 Yeah. Well, and I think we all have essentially just in my conversations with thousands and

00:57:39.160 thousands of people, it's like, we all want the same thing. We all want to be, be happy. We want

00:57:43.280 to find some fulfillment in our lives. We're going to have a little bit, a bit of money in the bank

00:57:46.300 account. We want to have some experiences with the people that we love. We all want this. You know,

00:57:50.680 I think of my son earlier in the year as we, or I guess last year when we were playing football,

00:57:55.360 he started to get down on himself and I asked him why he was down on himself. And he's like, dad,

00:57:59.060 I just, I'm not as fast as the running backs. And I said, well, yeah, that's true. You're not,

00:58:04.260 but you're also 50 to 60% bigger than they are. And you're a hell of alignment. Like if somebody

00:58:11.180 comes in front of you, like they're not going to get past you, you see the value in that, right?

00:58:16.440 He's like, yeah, I just wish I was fast. I said, what's the ultimate objective? He's like,

00:58:19.600 well, to win the game. And I said, great. We need fast guys and we need big guys blocking.

00:58:23.520 We need guys who can throw and guys who can catch. We need it all. But the objective is

00:58:27.420 that you're a team and we all have the same outcome to score more points than the other team.

00:58:31.160 I think this translates very, very well into the way that we interact with other people in our lives

00:58:36.160 as well. We can be different without being in competition with each other. And that's a big

00:58:40.780 part of it. Yeah, absolutely. Well, Chad, I know we're winding down on time here. I want to ask you

00:58:45.400 a couple of additional questions as we wrap things up. The first one is what does it mean to be a man?

00:58:50.540 My wife and I were recently having a conversation and we actually did an episode of my show on

00:58:55.540 Blaze TV called Humor Me about masculinity. And I said, you know, masculinity is not about how much

00:59:03.080 hair you grow on your chest and it's not how strong you are and how much you can lift. But being a man

00:59:08.560 is having that confidence to step out into the world, to know who you are, to have a sense of purpose,

00:59:15.740 have a sense of direction, knowing that you can be as fulfilled and successful as you want to be

00:59:25.940 on the inside and not allowing the external circumstances to define you. And I think to

00:59:32.060 the degree that we can do those things, we're successful as men, but I think it defines us as

00:59:36.500 men as well. Right on. Right on. Powerful. How do we connect with you? You've got the comedy tour,

00:59:41.700 you've got Humor Me, you've got your podcast and there's so many different ways. What's the best

00:59:45.900 way to connect with and follow up with you, Chad? Follow me on Facebook and also on YouTube. We're

00:59:50.460 now videoing the podcast in studio so people can get it on YouTube as well as on my Facebook,

00:59:55.540 Watch Chad Prather. You know, you can search Chad Prather on YouTube and find me on Twitter and

01:00:01.040 Instagram at Watch Chad. And then of course I'm all over Facebook. So yeah, we're out there,

01:00:06.340 we're doing about a hundred cities a year with the comedy tours. We're doing the Star Spangled

01:00:09.980 Banter Comedy Tour and we're just having a blast. It's a huge success in theaters all across

01:00:14.980 America. And then of course the Chad Prather Show podcast is out there where podcasts are available.

01:00:20.320 So we're having a great time running our mouth. Right on. You guys do a great job. I'll link it

01:00:24.180 all up so the guys know where to connect with you. Chad, I just want to tell you, man, I appreciate

01:00:27.960 you. Like I said, when we started this conversation, I've been tuned into what you're doing for the past

01:00:32.120 couple of years and everything that you said, have said is just so insightful. Really helped me

01:00:37.040 understand and articulate a little bit about what I know about myself and the message that I want to

01:00:41.740 share. And I just want to let you know that I appreciate you putting yourself out there because

01:00:45.360 I know that takes risk and it's certainly a challenge, but I'm a better man for it. So I

01:00:50.080 appreciate you, Chad. Hey, I appreciate that. And I appreciate what you do as well, Ryan. Thanks so

01:00:54.200 much for having me on today, man. There you go, guys. My conversation with the one and only Chad

01:00:59.560 Prather. I hope you enjoyed that one as much as I did. We had some very cool conversations,

01:01:04.040 a very good discussion on some subjects that, like I said, a lot of people aren't willing to

01:01:08.360 talk about because maybe they're a little afraid of the ridicule or pushback that they'll, well,

01:01:13.060 frankly, inevitably receive, but, uh, connect with Chad, check out his comedy tour, check out what

01:01:18.460 he's doing with his podcast, check out his website, connect with him on social media. You won't be

01:01:23.060 disappointed. You will be informed and you will also be entertained. So make sure you connect with

01:01:28.780 them there. Connect with me also on Instagram at Ryan Mickler. My last name is M I C H L E R.

01:01:34.360 And also on Twitter at Ryan Mickler as well. Let me know what you thought about the show and let me

01:01:39.560 know what you think about the movement in general. We need more men in this fight. So when you share

01:01:43.680 that stuff with me, when you share this podcast and this episode and the social media posts that

01:01:48.660 we're making with other people, you are enlisting other men that are needed, much needed in this

01:01:53.080 battle to reclaim and restore masculinity. So I will leave you there today, but I do want to thank

01:01:58.240 you as I always do for being in this fight with me for being the type of men that I aspire to be

01:02:02.840 like in your families and businesses and communities. I see what you guys are up to. I get messages

01:02:07.980 that inspire me to step up more fully. And you know what? I just wouldn't be the type of man that

01:02:12.960 I am today without you being on this path and on this journey with me. So again, we'll sign out for

01:02:19.020 today until tomorrow for the ask me anything with Kip Sorensen. And of course, Friday for your Friday

01:02:24.340 field notes, go out there, take action and become the man you are meant to be. Thank you for listening

01:02:30.780 to the Order of Man podcast. You're ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man you

01:02:35.820 were meant to be. We invite you to join the order at orderofman.com.

Order of Man - March 12, 2019

Politically Incorrect ｜ CHAD PRATHER

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